Ank'rahmun
Ank'rahmun is the pyramid city to the Southwest of Darashia, located in the Darama Desert . Local priests of Darashia worship the spirits of the temple, and make frequent pilgrimages to the city to this end. Due to its proximity to The Ogre's Oasis, the pilgrimage would be extremely dangerous were it not for a local "ogre tamer" located in the capital. The pyramid city was once the capital of the Darama Desert, and was a feat of engineering for the times. The pyramids were said to have been built in the form of the Greatest Volcano Asheron, from which the Darama Desert is believed to have come. The people's plentiful lifestyle was believed to have been blessed by the God of the Volcano, and all inhabitants of Ank'rahmun were devout followers to this end. Historians have said that evidence shows that the death of the Ank'rahmunians predates the decimation of the Greatest Volcano Asheron, with the following legend being popular among locals as an explanation: Ta'lia and Riedrick were a god's match, of this all of Ank'rahmun could see. Their joining was foreseen in the sky stars at birth, and their love for one another was seen in the stars of their eyes. It is said that even the Greatest Volcano Asheron was calm on the day of their wedding, and that Purple Skies (unlike the normal greyenss that resulted of Asheron's ashen blessing), were seen for that whole day. When they were with child, it was expected to be a premonition of another great Ank'rahmunian era, and the whole city awaited its coming. However, when the child came, it was cursed with white hair and white eyes, and red skin that pulsed in rivers across his body. The child was named For'twit, and was repulsive. '' ''The child coughed for four days and four nights, and its complexion rejected the ashen-dye that had collected in the skin of the Ank'rahmunian's over centuries, leaving them dark as night. When they feared that the child would not survive, and would lay its curse on the lands around it, Ta'lia and Riedrick were urged to vist Asheron to purify the baby. During their voyage, Asheron was as bountiful as it had ever been, blessing the land with black snow in blankets. When Ta'lia and Riedrick finally managed the steep climb to the altar, they prayed for six days and six nights for the child to improve. On the sixth night, a darkly apparition was said to come to them. Clothed in ash, it told them of the universe. The apparition spoke of the rise of the great dragonborn, the birth of the southernly mountains, and the inevitable eventual fall of the Ank'rahmun. The apparition then told them of how the child might be relieved of its complexion, and the blight that accompanied it. He instead implored them, "I am tired, I have worked too hard for too long. Please. Please let me sleep and the child will live". Ta'lia and Riedrick were advised to seek the greatest magicians across the land, and were told to instruct them to cleanse the mountain with water from the Elanyyr forest once every day until the child improved. '' ''Blessed with this new knowledge, and with the hope of preserving their people, Ta'lia and Riedrick gathered the best casters of the land. The city, once coated in sheats of diamond from the volcano, sold its glistening coat in exchange for the magely services, and for the first time the inhabitants became impoverished. The magicians came in the hundreds, and made an unnatural rain of the waters of the Elanyyr, once per day as instructed. The water drew with it the Ash in the air, and a sickly tar coated the streets daily. However, with each passing day, Asheron seemed to grow more and more calm, and the sky cleared until it was no longer the clouded purple that they knew, but a bright blue that had never been seen before. For'Twit flourished in this light, and as the days passed, his skin took to Asheron's blessing and darkened. '' ''However, the child's improvement came at a great cost. The Ank'rahmuns, unaccustomed to the demon eye in the sky, were blinded by the light and their eyes glazed over white, taking the ash-black into their vision. Their fields, forever used to the sun's only mild interest, withered in its glory, and died. Their lands, once exploding in fertility, became a cracked wasteland that matched their barren pyramids. And Asheron, which had been cooled beyond repair until its eventual explosion, was dormant. the Ank'rahmunians were forced out into the wild, blind as the child once was, and became nomads in their own lands. And For'Twit, who grew strong in the sun, was forever seen as the great curse and the great blessing, and as The One Who Saved Asheron. FUN FACT: The Ank'rahmunians were said to be prized toymasters, and have a gala of toys somewhere within the city. Many children beg to go on the pilgrimages to try and find this treasure-trove, but priests remind them that taking anything would be equivalent to grave-robbing.